Piranha Bytes - Risen 3 or Gothic 5?

Piranha Bytes was given a new developer award, and a german site called PC Games has a new video with Project Director Bjorn Pankratz.

In the video we get conformation of a new game, but as usual it seems we wont hear more till next year. Now for those of us that don't speak German here is a small google translation.

Finally a sign of life from the RPG specialists at Piranha Bytes that deal with Gothic 1-3 and Risen Risen 2 plus: have made a name for Dark Waters. The latter has clearly distinguished only by an unusual pirates and voodoo setting of the previous Piranha Games and cut in PC Games test with a very good 86 points . So far, there were only rumors surrounding a new Piranha role-playing game, most recently in September ( PC Games reported ).

For the Essenes Studio today's presentation of the German Developer Award in Dusseldorf is almost a home game. Of course, are also members of Piranha teams, including Project Director Björn Pankratz on site. We have intercepted him before the event and pestered for new information. You can tell Björn that he wants to give more details on favorite, but has yet to mention: "I can not say anything because we all have to wait until next year," he told PC Games. "Only this: It is a lot darker than the last We return again to go back to our roots.."

The last date Piranha Game - Risen 2: Dark Waters - was announced in February 2011 and released in April 2012, a year later. If this schedule is used again, much to be said for a release in spring 2015.

"Back to basics" - it sounds more like a new Gothic? After all, the rights to the series are back at Piranha Bytes after Arcania: Gothic 4 was known developed by Spellbound Entertainment for Jowood. Or want to leave you with a Risen, Piranha Bytes 3, the Palm world of Dark Waters behind and build on the dark-oppressive medieval fantasy atmosphere that dominates the team proven masterly?

So what do you all think? A new Gothic or will it be a new Risen game?

I love all of the Gothic games. The first one in the series will always be special for me because I spent about 100 hours playing it and it's the first game that I really put that kind of effort into. Really is the game that got me into gaming.

I spent even more hours on 2, which I bought immediately after finishing the first. It's a great game, but is plagued by some very frustrating bugs(true of the first as well).

The 3rd Gothic is epic. Also, more than 100 hours time on that game. It's almost unplayable from what I hear with any patching, but if you install the latest community patch it's great.

Gothic 4 is also a great game on PC, with all the patches installed. The game is, however, horrifically bad on Xbox, I'm talking unplayable bad. Being a PC gamer, I don't really care, but someone gave it to me as a gift for Xbox. After trying it, my impression was OMG, this is some real crap, what happened? Later,a gaming friend of mine told me that it's really good on PC, so I bought it, and he was right.

Risen is also one of my favorite action RPGs, ever.

The only game in the series that I was really disappointed with is Risen 2, which I bought on the first day of it's release. It's just not a very good game at all, compared to all the other games developed by Piranha bytes. And yes, I know that 4 was not developed by Piranha bytes, but it's still a very good game on PC.

I would rate the Gothic/Risen games in this order, best to worst.

Gothic 1
Risen
Gothic 3
Gothic 2
Gothic 4
Risen 2

Yeah, I know, most people say that Gothic 2 is the best. 3 is actually better with the community patch, and Risen 1 is a truly great game(except for the absurdly stupid ending). For me, 2 has too many extremely frustrating, game ending bugs that have not ever been fixed(I had to restart the game once, and twice go back to much earlier saves before I could finish it).

I for one am excited that Piranha Bytes is going to make another game. I just hope they learned something from their last disappointing effort and that the new game is more like Gothic 1, 2, or 3, or the first Risen.

The Name(*) doesn't matter as much as the gameplay and world design approach.

If they go bak to their roots on the "sandboxy" approach (as we have discussed) of the older games and design their world around bigger, more complex open ended areas then they will have my money on day 1 as usual

Gotta admit though that if they name the game Gothic nostalgia may play a number on me again anyways If there is a company that is still in business that I could be called a fanboy of its probably them

(* and By this I also mean the setting. I liked the Pirate setting well enough although I prefer the original one, true. But they are welcome to try any setting they feel like. They always do such an amazing job od designing believable worlds and populating them with realistic characters with gritty humorous competently written dialog that I feel they could easily do Scifi Steampunk or anything else they put their minds to )

P.S At any rate it is alway good to hear they are keeping hale and busy. And if you think about it, the fact alone that they publicly recognize and promise a return to the roots is worth gold! Yeah I am starting to feel the treacherous worm of hope in my heart

Since Risen 2 didn't exactly recieve great reviews i think they'd be stupid to not go back to Gothic. A new Gothic would give far more publicity than Risen 3, it certainly would get their fans attention too.

Personally I agree with you vurt. And it is quite possible they have started to view things the same way too.

They were a bit afraid to touch that hot potato until recently I believe i.e. this quote from Sascha Henrichs:

11. Would you like to go back to developing a new Gothic game?

Oh, ok, the following only represents my own opinion:

To be honest: not really. Whoever will develop a new Gothic, will get his fingers burned. He will be slashed by magazines and burned alive by die hard fans.

The expectations for this game would be so high, we couldn’t meet them.

The times have changed, the Gothic games lived up by a different mood, we were much more experimental back in the day. Gothic was something that was very exciting and the player could feel this loose and playful approach, but such things also led to exorbitant developing times and many many bugs. We fixed this, but we also parted from this sand box developing approach.

What is this desperate need for a new Gothic game? What is expected? Well, a Gothic 1 extension is expected. Basically the same game, but more of it and in a fresh looking environment. Despite the fact, that our company is no more the same like back in the day and we would have a hard time, getting back that “feel”, chances are, we would be accused of plagiarism and lack of innovation.

Like "copy-pasting" our selves. These are accusations we actually have to face very often; nearly after every new project. But in combination with a new Gothic, this would be terrible for the Gothic universe.

When we do this, this one has to be nailed. It has to be fabulous in every aspect and there should be a huge and long planning phase. I believe it will be developed some day. But not now.

I think what he says makes a lot of sense. But maybe they have come around to see it as their only chance to win the fandom (and some sales) back. I would have taken the bargain personally. But it might get them burned if they screw it up…

I was looking for that earlier, I thought I remembered someone over there saying they wanted to avoid the Gothic franchise. If that's still the case, I'd expect either Risen or a new franchise mixed with concepts from the Gothic series.

I loved the way they designed their games - the characters, story, setting, world which rewarded exploration etc. To be honest I did not enjoy Risen 2 that much and would prefer a return to something more like the original Gothic. That said, anything they designed which has the elements I liked would go down well. And…no pirates please.

no more fucking risen, i want orcs and paladins damn it, im tired of islands and palm trees
unfortunately seems its risen 3, there was that news some time ago where a band or orchestra leaked theyrecorded music for something called risen 3 blazing oceans

I'd just like to interject here and point out that I'm not going to say anything to spoil the mood, Chief. I'll just float here and watch. Don't mind me, just sitting here, floating and watching, that's me.

Risen 2 was really strange in that way, because when I listened to interviews - it seemed they'd learned a lot of hard lessons with Risen, and then they go and make combat worse - which was one thing that worked well in the first game

What they call it doesn't matter. All I care about it is the "feel", atmosphere and the world in PB games. I think both Risen and Gothic names (and indeed lore) are bit tarnished now after Gothic 3 and Risen 2 so why not a new game in a new world? Start completely fresh I say!

these are very nice news indeed.both Gothic and Risen series were unique for me cause although they had some serious problems they never mattered and still enjoyed them.damn i won't forget how i had to start Gothic 3 from the beginning ,after having completed 2/3 of the game, just because an orc holding a chalice fled away from a city i liberated before i could capture him

Nothing can make me happier than another Gothic 3-like PB game. Gothic 3 was considered to be broken and it really was, but still it provided some of the best gaming hours I ever had. I wonder what they can do with the formula without the obstacles they encountered during making G3. But this is all just make believe. They're done with risks and making big open-world game in that scale is definitely a risk even big companies do not wish to take. But no matter what they make, Risen 3 or Gothic 5 or a completely new game, I will anticipate its release more than anything.